Designing a Practice and Pedagogy of Postgraduate Supervision

Abstract

I sat down one spring day to write a book about walking and stood up again, because a desk is no place to think on the large scale (Solnit, 2000, p. 4). As I sat down to write this chapter I found myself reflecting on Rebecca Solnit’s statement in the opening pages of her book Wanderlust (2000) and I wondered, why did this text and this statement come to mind now? Here I am sitting and reflecting on my practice of postgraduate supervision and a text about walking comes to mind. I was introduced to the work of Rebecca Solnit by one of my supervisors when I was undertaking my own Ph.D. As a creative practitioner I had been exploring walking as a means of conceptualising the creative process, and I had yet to discover the world of theory in this area. In contrast, my interest in the practices of walking was founded in a framework of experiential knowing, grounded in proposition and a critique of other creative artists such as Richard Long, who walked as a means of creating.